Silent Storm
by GryfoTheGreat
Summary: Arya Stark wants nothing more than to get her half-brother back from the gang that supplies him with the heroin that controls him. But she can't do it alone - not without her mechanic, Gendry, who is adept with both cars and computers. Taking the gang down, though, will be far, far harder than she ever presumed... (A Song of Ice and Fire AU inspired by the TV series Love/Hate.)
1. Gendry I

**A/N:** Quick note: Arya is 18, Gendry is 23. Other characters have been aged up accordingly.  
I have nine chapters written, and I will publish one a week for the next two months. Your response will determine whether I will actually get off my ass and continue this.  
There will be lots of guns and dying and bikes in this. Don't expect anything else. This fic is where I put all my ANGER and my weird fascination with motorcycles.

* * *

**Part I: Prologue**

**Chapter 1**

The sixth time the wrench slips from his hand, Gendry admits defeat.

He got maybe an hour of sleep last night before his alarm shrilled at six and dragged him into real life. He stumbled through most of the day on auto-pilot, replacing alternators and rigging spark plugs and trying not to face-plant into the engines. It isn't like Mott noticed; the man's good, but he has faith that Gendry doesn't need someone hovering over him like a mother hen. Besides, Gendry at half-capacity is better than most at their best.

He doesn't regret his late night though, not at all. He wasn't out, even though Anguy and co. had invited him, and he's glad he resisted the siren song of beer and under-dressed girls, because he got a call from said friend at two in the morning asking him to get him out of detention. Hacking was infinitely preferable to bailing drunk morons.

He only really started hacking because he was bored. Secondary school was mostly unbearable for him; he wasn't dumb by any means, but his brain would never cooperate long enough for him to drag his grades up. As a consequence, he wasn't allowed onto any sports teams, even though he knew the boxing coach had attempted to dissuade the principal a few times. Without sport as an outlet and without enough money to buy more materials for the metalwork class, he turned to computers; he cut his teeth the school's old PCs, white and blocky, hopping over their firewalls with relative ease and astounding many with his ability to find pictures of boobs. He'd never done anything strictly illegal; in fact, he thought he'd helped a few companies, alerting them to the holes in their defences by smashing through them like a bull. The Bull. Stupid nickname, but he'd dealt with worse

_Bastard._

He sighs, and slams the bonnet shut a little more vehemently than is wise. Luckily, Mott isn't around; he's been leaving early recently. Something about his wife. Gendry rubs the sleep out of his eyes and takes a bleary-eyed glance at the clock on the wall. _Nine pm._ He's been up for fifteen hours straight on an empty tank and his eyes are beginning to feel like sandpaper. He had far too much fun with Casterly Corp last night, grabbing little bits of mostly pointless information that would piss them off big later. The Lannister's company is one of the best to deal with, being both near impenetrable and easily angered. They'll throw more money at the breach, but he'll just break it again and again and again.

He begins to clean up, mind wandering toward his bed, when headlights illuminate the garage. It's late, and the garage is closed, so they're probably in the wrong place. In any case, he ignores them, pushing the car to the back of the garage and wiping the grease off his hands. He's making his way towards the back office to turn off the radio, playing low-volume rock, when the door swings open.

He turns around slowly and surveys the vehicle first, as is his wont; a motorcycle, monstrous, jet-black and dented. There's no brand on it; custom-made, and expensive at that. He turns his eyes right to examine the rider, who is not nearly as threatening as her bike. A slip of a thing, hair trussed back, eyes big in her pale face, and not a day past eighteen. Can she even get up on that beast?

"Are you the mechanic?" There's a musical lilt to her voice, and she drags her vowels. Posh.

"No, the cleaning lady." Her eyes narrow. "Of course I'm the mechanic, but that doesn't matter. We're closed."

"That's not what the sign out front says." Her lips twist, as if she knows she's got him. _Shit._ He always forgets to flip the dumb sign. She pushes her bike towards him, and he grabs the bars deftly. It's heavy, heavy enough that he's surprised she could drag it along. "Can you fix it?"

He throws her an offended look and hoists it onto the workbench, grabbing a screwdriver to prise the panels off and reveal the engine. He can't help it; he whistles. How much money has gone into this thing? Enough to buy this garage twice over, he reckons. "What the fuck did you do to it?"

"I drove it." She sidles up beside him, grey eyes assessing the damage.

"Were you trying to break the sound barrier?" She snorts, and a grin slides, unbidden, onto his face; maybe this girl isn't quite as icy as she seems.

"Maybe." She pauses, waiting for him to give her an answer; really, he's seen all he needs to, but he's beyond tired and he wants to annoy this kid. Her toe taps impatiently. "Well?" she eventually bursts.

"Yup. It'll be expensive, though." He names the price, and she doesn't even flinch; he didn't expect her to. It isn't just the bike and her accent; her jacket and boots gleam in a way that only real leather does, the cut of her jeans screams designer, and her hair, tied back as it is, has the razor-sharp edges only a professional hairdresser could achieve, unlike Gendry's own hacked off effort. He hasn't been examining her on purpose; it's just something his hyperactive mind does, snagging onto random details and over-analysing them.

She pays him in cash, however, which is strange; in his experience, trust-funders always flash plastic, but this girl hands over the bills with an exacting eye. He doesn't bother counting; she didn't cheat him.

"Be back here in two days..." he trails off, realising she never told him her name. "Sorry."

She looks at him strangely, and he sees a small struggle flare behind her eyes; finally, she sighs and sticks her hand out. "Arya." It's a pretty name, but she snaps the syllables out like a dare.

He takes her hand. "Gendry." He does his best not to crush her hand, but if he did hurt her, she doesn't show it.

"Two days." She retracts her hand, but doesn't step out of his space. Her face has gone from cool courtesy to hot determination, her eyes sharper as they fasten on his.

"Yes, ma'am." She flinches at the title, and he smiles to himself in triumph; no, definitely not as icy. She clear her throat, and stomps out. Abruptly, her steps pause at the door and he glances at her, puzzled, only to see her flip the sign around so that _OPEN _glares at him in scarlet letters. She gives him a tight-lipped smile, and disappears out the door. A few moments later, he hears the car rumble away.

He rolls his neck, and all the alertness from his conversation with Arya drains away; it takes all he has not to collapse right there. He isn't particularly extroverted; talking tires him, and that girl didn't really talk. She fought. He doesn't know who won that.

He drags the bike into a corner, hand sliding over the cool steel of the fairing. He finishes up, turns off the radio and the lights, and exits, scowling at the sign. He almost flips it around out of spite, but he kinda needs this job.

Even though he almost dozed off on the bus, when he gets home it takes a while for him to conk; every time he shuts his eyes, he gets the strangest feeling that he is being watched, a grey gaze raking up and down his back in cold shivers.

When he finally falls asleep, he dreams of a pack of wolves, howling at a moonless sky.


	2. Arya I

**A/N: **Here's the next chapter! The POV will alternate between Gendry and Arya, so this chapter is from Arya. (I'm totally not copying Untouchable. Nope. Not a chance.)

* * *

When Arya eventually gets back into the car, sliding into the passenger seat, it takes Sansa a few minutes to notice that she's actually returned. She tosses her phone down beside her and glances at Arya as she fiddles with the radio, retuning it from pop to the station that was playing inside.

"Well?" Sansa asks, starting the engine up with a purr. If the guy inside freaked at her bike, he'd have had a heart attack over this smooth black saloon.

"He'll fix it."

"He must be some sort of prodigy. I told you not to try and drive that thing while you're angry!"

Arya ignores the admonishment, even though she knows it's true. Just, that night... she needed to get out, away from the Starks. "What do I owe you?"

Even though Sansa is ostensibly the beauty of their family, she's not dumb in any way; she rarely does anything out of the goodness of her heart, not any more. "Walk Lady for me when I go back to college, please?"

Another dog. Arya already walks her own dog, Nymeria, and occasionally Summer; Bran can't exactly keep up with him, even though Summer is one of the most sweet-tempered of their pack, besides Lady. Maybe even Ghost, too.

_Ghost._ The dog who left with his owner, the missing link in their family

Arya shakes her head, pressing her palms into her eyes. "Fine." She'd hoped Robb would give her a lift, but he was working late tonight, tying up the loose ends on some case. Instead, Sansa drove her in, and Rickon helped her heave her motorbike into Sansa's spacious boot while the girl herself tapped her polished nails and yelled at them to hurry up.

"So... what was he like?"

"Who?" Arya is too busy thinking about her brothers.

Sansa sighs. "The mechanic! Duh!" Her face takes on a conspiratorial cast, and she leans over to whisper in Arya's ear. "Jeyne gets her car fixed here, and she says he's grade A."

Arya lets out a snort as her sister giggles. "You know I don't notice things like that!" After Sansa pouts at her for a few seconds, she relents. "But he was definitely built." Arya has a tendency to assess the muscular condition of everyone she meets, similar to how she used to weigh her boxing opponents up as they got into the ring. "Nice eyes, I guess." Blue, the colour of a halcyon summer sky. She had the strange feeling she'd seen the exact shade before, but she doubted it; few people had eyes as ultramarine as that. Also, he wrinkled his forehead in a way that was both cute and irritating, but she would rather die before she admitted that to Sansa.

"Nice _eyes_. You're a bit helpless, aren't you?" Sansa turns left, fluorescent light setting her hair aflame.

Arya doesn't bother arguing. Boys never caught her attention, at least not in the way they caught Sansa's. Just as well; nobody would ever care to even look at skinny, grumpy Arya Horseface, not beside Sansa and her her auburn waves and cornflower eyes. While Sansa was doing the kissing, Arya did the fighting; the day she got suspended for knocking a boy who was four years her senior unconscious is one of her proudest. It wasn't her fault, not strictly; he'd been talking shit about Jon, and even the teachers agreed that he deserved it... but they still suspended her. Rickon seems to be eager to continue her legacy of kicking ass and taking names, from her mother's frequent, increasingly exasperated conversations with his teachers.

"Arya..."

"What now?" She knows she's snapping, but she's irritated and Sansa's perfume is giving her a headache.

"Just... don't do that again. I know Mom can be sort of... unreasonable, about that whole thing, but when you stormed off... I was so scared. It was raining, it was dark, and you looked just about ready to kill... I honestly thought you wouldn't come back."

"I did." Arya keeps her voice soft, and tries not to feel guilty. "And our brother isn't a thing, Sansa. He's a person, and he needs our help."

Her sister's fingers tighten around the steering wheel, and she remains silent for a few seconds, perfectly glossed lip pressing together. "I love him too, you know that... but I don't want you to get hurt. Not ever."

Arya hears her meaning; if she does go after Jon, she will get hurt.

"I can take care of myself, Sansa."

"I know." Her sister's hand leaves the steering wheel and settles over her own for a brief moment. Arya glances at their joined fingers; Sansa's hands are elegant and soft, her slim fingers bedecked with rings and her nails painted delicate pink, whereas Arya's hands are rough and calloused, her nails cut short. She squeezes her sister's hand and then withdraws her own. That's the second time she's touched someone today, which is odd; Arya isn't big on physical contact, unless she's punching someone.

Nevertheless, the gesture touches her, and they spend the rest of the ride arguing companionably over the radio; if Arya has to listen to one more sappy pop ballad, she'll puke.

* * *

She hangs around the house for the next few days, attempting not to explode. Silently, she curses Robert Baratheon; the only reason her father had bothered to move them down to King's Landing for the foreseeable future was because his old friend had demanded that he do so. Arya knows her father misses Winterfell, just as she does; there, the first snows would already be falling, but down here in the south, the only evidence of winter is a slight chill. She can't go hiking; she'd have to drive to the Kingswood to find anything even remotely resembling nature, and to find mountains she'd have to go to the Stormlands. She doesn't want to explore the city, either; she tried, the first few days, but all she saw were homeless people sleeping in thin blankets as perfectly coiffed women glided by. Sansa invited her out with her and her friends a few times, but Arya loathes dressing up; her only skirt is her old school skirt, and she wore that twice. Sansa loves skirts, pretty, floaty lace things worn with stockings and knitted jumpers, or tight shiny ones to be paired with sheer black tops and sky-scraper heels.

When she finally grows bored of wailing on her punching bag, she decides to take matters into her own hands. There's one advantage to King's Landing; Jon.

She knows where he lives, if it can be called living; she did a bit of digging, bullied Theon, Robb's investigative partner, into letting her use the police database and scrolled through endless lists of junkies, drawn-out faces bearing tremulous looks of fear. She almost went straight past Jon; only his Stark grey eyes caught her, told her he was her brother. It gave an address and a list of associates. They didn't look particularly tough; one had a beard that was little more than fluff, and another looked more like a pig than anything else.

She meets the pig boy when she finally decides to visit the address, slipping out under the pretence of visiting an old school friend. She wears a hoodie, and on the bus old ladies walk by her seat to sit elsewhere.

The house is in disrepair, gaps in its windows covered by thin wood, iron railing bent and rusted. There's no knocker on the door, and the doorbell hangs off the wall, torn wires barely keeping it attached to the grubby concrete. She hammers on the wood, yelling for someone to open the damn door, when the fat boy opens it. He peers out through the gap, foot anchored behind it.

"What do you want?" he asks, voice shaky

"To see my brother," Arya tells him, and makes her best attempt to muscle past. The boy shuts the door tighter, until only his eyes are visible.

"I'm sorry, but you must be in the wrong place!" he squeaks. "And if your brother's here... well, he's not your brother anymore."

Arya snarls; she's met the same attitude from her parents, and she's sick of it. "Let me see Jon, or I'll-!"

"Arya?" Someone appears behind the boy, someone with her eyes.

"Jon!" she cries, and finally shoves the boy out of the way to hug her brother. He's nothing but skin and bone, far lighter than the man she remembers, roaring around on his motorcycle and beating Bran at darts.

"You shouldn't be here," is the first thing he says when she lets go of him, fingers fastening around his forearms. She tries to ignore the tell-tale track marks. "It's dangerous. If anything happened to you, Robb would have my head."

"If it's dangerous for me, it's dangerous for you." She grabs his chin. "Come home with me. Please! We all miss you so much; Bran's moody, Rickon gets into fights every day, and Sansa barely spends any time at home!"

"Your mother doesn't miss me," he says steadily, grey meeting grey.

If anything, Arya gets angrier. "She doesn't matter! You matter! I want you back! I want my brother back!"

Jon shakes her off and steps away, casting his eyes at the wall. "I'm not your brother," he states finally, voice barely above a whisper.

"I don't give a shit who your mother is, I just want you-"

"Arya... I can't come back. Not ever." Jon never looked defeated, not like this man with his slumped shoulders and lowered eyes.

"I don't blame you, you know that-"

"But I do." He lifts his gaze to her, and she finally notices the bags underneath his eyes, the tangles in his hair, the half-healed cuts marring his greyish skin. It pains her to admit it, but the boy currently cowering in the corner is right; her brother is gone.

"I'll bring you back," she growls, "if it's the last thing I do."

He regards her tiredly. "It might just be."

She storms out then, unable to take it anymore. This shell is not her brother, but she can see Jon Snow in there somewhere, and gods help the man that tries to stop her from saving her brother.

On the bus home, an idea takes root in her head; fanciful, mad and near impossible. While she was searching for Jon, a name caught her eye. Clegane.

Robb's told her about the Mountain, one of the most notorious dealers in King's Landing. Brutal, with no regard for secrecy; he doesn't care as long as he's turning a profit. Who the profits go to, no-one will say, but Arya has her suspicions, and her instincts are almost always correct.

For now, she has a bike to pick up.


	3. Gendry II

**A/N:** I like this chapter a lot, seeing as it involves motorcycles, heavy injuries, and awkward bandaging.

* * *

Mott lets him off early, for which Gendry is thankful. He's been pulling long nights for the past few days, trying to get that girl's bike up to scratch. He doesn't really know why he worked so hard on it; maybe some stupid part of his mind that needed him to prove himself, especially to a rich kid like her. He's always hated that whole complex he's always had, the one that reminds him he's an orphan with no family and no hope. Wasted potential, doomed to mundanity.

But he's being dramatic; more likely it was because the motorcycle itself was such a brilliant machine. He didn't mind working on cars, but you got bored of people-carriers and bangers, and that bike was anything but. Hand-built from the bottom up, attention and thought going into every single decision, as well as a shit-ton of money. It was built for speed, but he guessed it could stand up to some rough-housing, too, and that was why it had survived whatever its owner had done with it. As far as he could tell, it was a crash, but it mustn't have been too serious; the girl was in one piece, and she wasn't limping. He couldn't really imagine someone like her building that motorcycle; something like that would require patience, and even from their brief meeting he already knew that she didn't have a whole lot.

In any case, the bike was done; shining, functional, maybe even better than before. Mott sent him home before the girl came to collect it, and he tried not to feel disappointed. Whatever. It wasn't like she was going to give him her number.

He gets off the bus at his stop; Flea Bottom. It's not a nice neighbourhood, not by any means, but it's all he's ever known. At the very least, rent is cheap, and beer even cheaper.

He manages to dodge the landlord on his way up to his flat, even though it comes close; luckily, he's too busy arguing with the woman downstairs who insists on feeding her cats at three in the morning to notice him. When he gets in, there's a pile of mail all over his floor, but he doesn't bother checking it and kicks it aside. He's not hungry, just tired, so even though it's only four, he crashes into his narrow bed and sleeps.

When he wakes up again, all the light is gone; winter's grip on King's Landing is beginning to tighten. Aimlessly, he goes for a shower and opens the bedroom window after to let the steam out. His phone shrills, so, after pulling on some pants, he moves to the flat's only other room to pick up.

It's just Anguy; sighing, he rejects it. All Anguy ever wants is more money, and Gendry has none to give. He's considered siphoning funds from back accounts before; even with his shitty laptop, he is completely capable of it. He did come close a few times, when the water was shut off and the fridge was bare, ready to remove thousands from some rich company's overflowing coffers... but he never did it. Gendry never had money, and he doesn't really know what he would do with it.

As he lowers the phone, a _bang_ reaches his ears, coming from the direction of his bedroom. He stiffens. Flea Bottom isn't exactly safe, but he's never been broken into before. This poor bastard probably expected some weak single mom, not six-foot Gendry with an old hammer.

He bursts through the door, expecting to find some kind of thief, but instead he finds a skinny girl curled up on the floor in a puddle of blood.

"Shit!" he exclaims, and, dropping the hammer, rushes over to check the window, which, judging from the trail of blood, is probably how she entered. She yanks him back when he sticks his head out.

"Dumbass! They might still be... you!"

Crouched down beside her, he sees a very familiar pair of eyes. Grey eyes.

"Seven hells," he says finally. He sees something clutched in her hand. "Wait. Is that a gun? What in the name of all the gods are you doing with a gun?"

"Scratching my head," she says drolly, giving it to him without protest. "Do you live here? Or is this your girlfriend's place?"

He raises an eyebrow, and she nods jerkily towards his bare chest. For some reason that he isn't going to think about, he blushes "No. My place. No girlfriend."

"Well, that makes things easier," she sighs.

His heart beats a little faster. What is he, a teenage girl? "What things?"

"The things where you stop me from dying." His surprise drains away and he notices the sticky blood staining the sleeve of her jacket and her jeans, her arm cradled close to her chest. "I should be okay. I was wearing a helmet, I don't think I'm concussed."

"You don't think?" he asks, incredulously.

"Just pick me up and fix me, will you? I'm sure a mechanic can deal with a sprained elbow."

He admits defeat and picks her up, taking care not to jostle her arm. She's heavier than she looks; she must have some muscle mass. Her head knocks into his chest, blood from her arm smearing on his skin.

He lays her in the bathtub as carefully as he can, and surveys the damage. Cuts scraping down her side; he'll have to wash them and apply pressure. He takes her jacket off, attempting not to cause her pain; she screws her face up, and he feels like apologizing, but bites it back. The elbow sprain needs an ice pack and rest. Otherwise, she's whole.

"Wait here," he commands, as he finds what he needs. Ice pack, towel, tweezers (he saw some dirt in the wounds), gauze, scissors.

"Arm first," he tells her when he gets back. She's leaning back, head resting on the rim of the tub as he takes her arm gently, laying it on the side. He grabs the scissors and cuts the soiled fabric away, pulling it carefully from her broken skin as she winces.

"I liked that top," she grouses.

"Tough shit." He fills a cup with water and sluices the worst of the blood off her arm, before picking the tweezers up. "This might hurt," he tells her, and she nods, lips pressed together.

He picks the debris out, and when he's happy that the wounds are clean her starts on her elbow. He wraps the ice pack in a towel and quickly, so as not to cause her more pain, ties it around her elbow. She grits her teeth.

"That's the worst of it," he reassures her, picking up the gauze and wrapping it around her arm. She pulls it back and cradles it against her chest.

"My leg," she reminds him.

_Ah_. He'd forgotten. "Can you sit up?"

She tries to rise, but crashes back heavily against the tub, letting out a small cry. "Nope," she hisses through gritted teeth.

"Maybe..." He stands up to hook his arms under hers and pulls her, slowly, to sit against the wall, and then takes her leg so that it hangs over the edge of the tub. "There. Now..."

The damage to her leg is considerable; he'll have to cut her jeans away. Something about that puts him on edge; she's a kid, barely legal, and he's not entirely comfortable doing this.

Granted, most eighteen-year-olds don't land in stranger's apartments with a gun and lot of injuries, but hey.

"Cut the damn things off."

"Hmm?" His head whips up, and though she's lost a lot of blood, she apparently has some to waste on a blush.

"Cut the jeans off. I mean, you've already ruined my top, so you might as well ruin the rest." She settles back against the wall, determinedly avoiding his eyes.

"Uh... okay." He picks the scissors up, and begins to cut the ruined fabric away. She hisses, and grabs his shoulder, squeezing it in pain. Luckily, her hips are relatively uninjured, so he doesn't have to contend with underwear. (There is a very small part of him that is disappointed, and another part that wants to know if she wears boxers or briefs. He banishes those parts as best he can.) There's less dirt in these wounds, and as he washes them he can't help but notice how well-muscled her thighs are. He wonders if she does some sort of martial art; it wouldn't surprise him.

"You're good at this," she murmurs, as he grabs the gauze.

"I got into a lot of fights when I was a kid," he replies as he tears a piece of the material off. "Somebody had to patch me up."

"I thought people didn't pick on the big kid?" There's laughter in her voice; she sounds young, more her age.

"The smart ones didn't." She snorts, and again, a stupid grin makes its way onto his face. What is with him? "You're done."

She makes to get up, but her exhausted body betrays her and she crashes down again.

"Did I say you could leave?"

She glares up at him. "Do I give a fuck about what you want?"

He stands up to tower over her. Being tall can be an issue when you're dealing with doors, but his height is incredibly useful when he needs to intimidate people. "You started giving a fuck when you broke into my flat looking like shit. I need answers."

She scowls like an angry child being denied a biscuit. He almost laughs, but that would make his case worse, so he refrains, lips curling up.

"Fine. You win. Get me out of this bathroom and then we can talk."

He complies, lifting her up again. Her bare leg brushes against him, and he concentrates on walking straight.

"I feel like a sack of potatoes," she complains as he sets her down on the couch.

"You are until you can walk," he calls as he walks back into the bedroom. It is, after all, winter, and he needs some sort of shirt. When he comes back, he swears Arya's eyes flicker to his chest, and she looks somewhat disappointed. Trying not to feel pleased, he settles down beside her.

"You're a terrible host," she says petulantly.

"I just fixed you up!"

"You haven't even offered me anything to drink," she grumbles.

"I don't have anything to drink." She must get a thrill out of antagonising people.

"Not even water?"

He grimaces. "Wouldn't risk it. Also, you got blood all over my carpet. I hope you'll pay for that."

She flaps her hand dismissively. "Whatever."

"Stop changing the subject, Miss Rich Bitch. What were you doing?"

She stares at her feet for a few long seconds. "Chasing the Bloody Mummers," she admits.

His voice pitches up."What? Why?" The Bloody Mummers? He's heard of them, but nothing good. What sticks in his mind is their reported penchant for chopping off people's hands and feet.

"They have my brother." Her voice is quiet.

He sighs. "If they have your brother, he's dead or worse."

He must have said the wrong thing; suddenly, her hackles rise, and she outright growls. "No! I've seen him, he's okay, I can get him back! I just need to-"

"Kill all the drug dealers in King's Landing?"

Her eyes meet his, and he sees something behind the grey. Steel, perhaps.

"If that's what it takes," she says, voice soft.

He has nothing to say to that. Maybe she's just a kid with a shiny bike, but there's so much raw determination in her that he almost believes she's capable of it, of eradicating all the filth that clings to this city.

"Where's your bike?" he says suddenly. She mentioned a helmet earlier, so she must have used it. By the gods, if she totalled it, he'll sprain her other elbow.

"I hid her, she's safe. I'm lucky I didn't fall off earlier; then, they would have caught me."

"Did you get any of them?" He hasn't forgotten the gun.

"No... I got one in the arm, though. He won't be up for a while." She sounds smug and satisfied.

"Well done." He makes a valiant effort not to sound sarcastic; it fails utterly, and she throws him a dirty look.

"Shut up."

They sit in companionable silence, until Gendry notices the time.

"Isn't it past your bedtime?"

She swears under her breath. "I can't go back, not like this. My parents will skin me... I told them I was staying with a friend."

"Well, you can," he offers.

She glares at him coldly. I don't have any friends here."

"I wasn't talking about that."

She stares at him vacantly, until something dawns on her face.

"Please? Can I?" When he nods, her eyes warm a little.

"I think you're big enough for the couch."

She shoots him a dirty look, but lies down anyway, grabbing a blanket from the back of the couch. "Gods, I'm wrecked..." She stretches languidly, like a lazy cat; Gendry is caught between laughing and staring as the hem of her (ruined) top shifts dangerously high. For his safety, he decides to leave. He quickly unfurls the ice pack from around her arm and stows it in the freezer.

"Night, I guess." He throws a glance over his shoulder as she fails to respond; her face is buried in the cushions, uninjured arm brushing against the ground. Her socked feet sway in the air, boots long abandoned.

Once in the safe confines of his room, he pulls his laptop out for the first time in two days. If Arya won't tell him her story, some doxing will. He accesses the database of registered motorcycle owners in King's Landing; when that comes up empty, he tries to think. Her motorcycle's reg... It wasn't CL, for Crownlands, like most of the vehicles he fixes; it was N. The North. He changes his search to the North, looking for female motorcyclists around 18 years old.

She pops after a few minutes of scrolling. He glances at her last name, and almost has a heart attack. _Arya Stark_, the profile proclaims, as she scowls from her license picture.

_Stark_. He searches it, and immediately find results; a healthy stock portfolio for Winterfell Inc., a picture of two boys of a similar age, one red-haired and one dark-haired, at a school event, speculations on a gossip site on the status of Joffrey Baratheon and Sansa Stark's relationship, a picture of the clan at some event. Arya stands in the middle, visibly displeased to be wearing a dress. The dark-haired boy is not present.

Fuck. He knew she was rich, but the Starks traced their ancestry all the way back to one of the seven great houses of old, and even further back to the Kings of the North, and before that, to the First Men. Technically, Arya is not Miss Rich Bitch. She's _Lady _Rich Bitch.

He sits back, and tries not to panic. He has a very heavily injured Arya Stark sleeping on his couch, and no idea what to do.

Groaning, he decides to sleep on it. Maybe when he wakes up, she'll be gone, and he'll never see her again.


	4. Arya II

**A/N: ***SHOWS UP LATE WITH STARBUCKS*  
Sorry. Updates will be on time from now on, I promise!

* * *

When Arya wakes up, at first, the only thing she can feel is pain.

Her elbow sends jolts up her arm every time she moves it, and the cuts are a dull ache on her skin. Her back is cramped from sleeping on the couch, and a headache is beginning to throb behind her brow. She feels very much like she's gone twenty rounds with Syrio.

She stretches again, trying not to disturb her elbow. She's gotten into all sorts of scrapes before, so she's no stranger to sprains and fractures, but nothing like this. The last time she fell off her bike, she was lucky enough to land in the middle of a grass verge, and suffered nothing more than a bruised knee. This time...

_She speeds down the street, weaving between cars as they roar behind her. She's in too deep, they're pissed, she didn't think it would be this..._

All she did was visit a bar the 'Brave Companions' were supposed to frequent; the Black Goat, it was called. It sure stank like goats. She supposes they didn't take kindly to some kid landing in on them and insulting them. Before she knew it, they were chasing her out, guns blazing.

_She swerves down a side street, glimpsing an empty garage. She hears the bikes roar past her; they missed her, thank the gods. But she's going too fast, she can't slow down-_

She bore the brunt of the damage in that collision; Jon's old bike escaped unscathed. She wheeled it into the abandoned garage, and staggered off to find somewhere to lick her wounds. It was then that she glimpsed an open window, easily accessible by a fire-escape's stairs.

_She thumps inside; luckily, the room is empty. The window is slightly fogged up. The occupant must have showered recently. She tries to move, but she can't, her elbow is screaming..._

And that was when her mechanic entered, half-naked, with the such a hilarious look of surprise in his bright blue eyes that she almost burst out laughing.

He fixed her up, though; she can't complain about that. She would have had no idea how to do it herself. He was surprisingly gentle, despite those big paws of his, and he probably didn't realise it, but he blushed when he was cutting her jeans away; she would have punched him, but she was too weak to do much except stare at him and the creases on his forehead as he concentrated on cleaning her wounds.

She wonders what Sansa would think; invading a stranger's flat covered in blood, giving out to him for not giving her a glass of water and crashing on his couch. Sansa would probably disregard all that and worry about Arya's _honour,_ whatever little shred of it was left. In any case, she doesn't think Gendry has that in him. Granted, she's known him for about three days, in but in those days he fixed her bike and bandaged her wounds, so she thinks her opinion is justifiable.

Said man picks then to enter, bedroom door banging against the wall. Something flickers over his face when he sees her, but it doesn't stay long enough for her to pin down exactly what it is.

"You look like shit," she comments, pulling herself into a sitting position.

He grumbles at her indistinctly, but doesn't refute her, because she's right. He must be some sort of insomniac; this is the second time she's seen him so wrecked.

"What's the plan?" His words are interrupted by an expansive yawn.

"You need to go back to bed." He smiles tightly at that. "Me, I need to get out of here."

"Dressed like that?" When met with her questioning gaze, he nods towards her torn clothing.

"Ah." She'd be picked up by a cop and given a sexual assault form to fill out if anyone saw her like that. "So first I need clothes." Her stomach rumbles. "And food."

"Unless you've forgotten, I'm three times your size."

"Buy them." She extricates a few bills from her pocket, not bothering to count; she knows she has enough. His eyes go wide when he snatches the bills from her outstretched fingers. "And some food. I'm a size small, by the way."

"Am I your servant?" He looks at her incredulously.

"Chop chop." She lies back down, curling up; he sighs, and a few seconds later, leaves. She pops up then, swearing when her elbow jolts in pain. She sniffs herself, and makes a face; she needs to shower. Gendry won't mind her using his bathroom, not after she got blood all over it yesterday.

The bathroom is absolutely tiny. The mirror is cracked, the tub doesn't look to be half long enough for a man of Gendry's stature, and the water pressure is weak. She doesn't care; she peels her bandages off, hops in, and makes a half-hearted attempt at being polite and tries not to use too much hot water.

Afterwards, she is loath to wear her old, ruined clothes, and if she swanned around in her underwear poor Gendry would have a heart attack, so instead she raids his wardrobe. Actually, calling it a wardrobe would be generous; it's just a shelf with a door that refuses to stay shut. She thinks of Sansa's massive walk-in wardrobe and feels a strange stab of guilt. He doesn't have a lot of clothing, but she finds a worn t-shirt and a pair of shorts that, though probably small on him, are laughably large on her.

Entering the kitchen, she inspects her wounds to find that they have mostly scabbed over. She can do without the bandages for now, but she needs to ice her arm again. While she's rooting around in the freezer for the ice-pack, Gendry returns, laden down with groceries.

"Glad to see you've been helping yourself," he comments, dumping plastic bags on the floor.

"Your clothes are better than no clothes." Suddenly he is beside her, yanking her out of the freezer by the scruff of her shirt as he locates the icepack immediately. He fastens it around her arm, and she lets out a pleased gasp as the pain begins to recede into numbness.

"Go and put these on instead. I like that t-shirt." He throws a bag at her, and she rummages around in it to find a pair of jeans, a black t-shirt and a thick grey zip-up hoodie. Its long sleeves will help disguise her injuries; she feels a small burst of gratitude towards him. He may look rather constipated every time he thinks, but he must have some sort of a brain rattling around in there.

"I think it looks better on me," she replies. "I'm keeping it."

He grumbles, and looks over at her to give her a piece of his mind, but she can hear him stumble over his words as she strips said t-shirt off. She wishes she could see his face.

"Arya!"

"What?" She sticks her head up as she pulls the t-shirt over it.

"Go get dressed in the bedroom, please." He's looking resolutely away from her, but even from here she can see that his ears are bright red.

She huffs. "Fine. Spoilsport. Surely you've had naked people in here before?"

"Besides the point. Bedroom. Now."

"Bedroom. Now," she parrots, imitating his low voice.

He splutters. "Get out or I won't feed you."

She admits defeat and stomps off, trying not to laugh. She used to pull that trick in the locker room, sometimes, after boxing; one time, poor Cley Cerwyn almost fainted. Sansa used to give out to her after, but what did it matter? Arya really didn't have much to show, to be honest.

When she returns, fully clothed, Gendry has calmed down, but he still won't meet her eyes.

"What's on the menu?" she asks, settling herself in a chair.

"Eggs, bacon, coffee," he mumbles, as he cracks eggs into a pan.

He stomach grumbles again. "I think I'll keep you," she tells him. "The last time I tried to cook bacon I ended up with charcoal." He laughs at that, and she makes a face at him; he only laughs harder. Giving up, she lays her head on the table; the cool of the Formica helps relieve her headache. Distracted, she watches Gendry cook as her mind wanders.

She knows now that she needs a plan. Going in with her guns blazing won't work; she needs to infiltrate the cartel and take it down from the inside, preferably from the top; the longer you fall, the harder you land. But how? Perhaps she's not recognisable to someone like Gendry, but these men will know her grey eyes immediately. All the big families know each other, and the leader of the Bloody Mummers – Hoat, he was called – wore a ring that was rather distinctly shaped like a lion mid-roar. In this country, lions can only mean one thing.

If she's to avoid detection, she'll need a disguise, and she'll need help. Sansa will aid her, but not directly, especially if that family is involved. She will need someone reliable; perhaps not someone to rush in by her side, but someone to provide remote back-up. Maybe someone technologically proficient; gods know how much dirt she could dig up with a good hacker behind her. Arya's decent with computers, but not that good; Bran was always the brains of their family, and she won't get him involved if she can help it.

As for the disguise... an idea is simmering in her mind. It's crazy, but it just might work.

From now on, the dealers will be on the lookout for long-haired, tomboyish, but undeniably female Arya Stark. What they won't expect is an actual boy.

Her thoughts are interrupted by Gendry plonking a loaded plate down in front of her, followed by a large mug. The bacon is dripping with grease, she's pretty sure there are more than three eggs on her plate, and the coffee smells strong enough to knock a small child out; in other words, Sansa's worst nightmare.

Arya digs in with gusto. By the time she's drained the last drop of coffee from her mug, Gendry is staring at her in awe, having only barely finished his.

"Where the fuck did you put all that?" he asks bemusedly. His forehead has crinkled up again.

"I'm a growing girl," she tells him, stretching; she always does after a meal.

He shakes his head, muttering, and sets about drinking his coffee as she rises to wash her plate and mug. She may be rich, but, being culinarily challenged, she's usually assigned to washing-up duty at home. As such, she's rather good at it; she never met a pan she didn't scrub within an inch of its life.

Once the kitchenette is sparkling clean, she turns to face Gendry, who is shrugging a jacket on.

"Where are you going?" she asks.

"Work," he replies, without looking at her. "But first, we're gonna go get your bike. Do you have everything?" He nods at her elbow, and she remembers to remove the ice pack and put it back in the freezer. She grabs her torn clothes, lamenting the loss of her jacket, but she'll be fine without it; she was born and raised amid the snows of Winterfell. He raises an eyebrow at her.

"Don't even think about offering me your jacket," she threatens, and he lifts his hands in a pacifying gesture.

She sets off down the stairs before him, feet thudding in discordant unison against the concrete steps. She notices lewd graffiti scrawled on the walls, and rust stains leaking from the railings. When she almost trips over one half-crumbled step, Gendry grabs her uninjured elbow to save her from splitting her skull open. She brushes him off.

Outside, the weak winter light does little to help her headache. Where did she leave her bike? She sets off to the left, in the opposite direction from the bus stop located a few hundred yards down the street, and halts when she notices that Gendry is following her.

"What are you doing?" she demands.

"Going to buy a carton of milk. What do you think?" There's a combative look on his face, drawing his brows together; it reminds her of Robb and how he used to stare down Sansa's potential suitors.

"I don't need someone to protect me," she hisses, setting off at a brisk pace; to her annoyance, he catches up to her in a few long strides. She curses her short legs.

"Of course not. You're well able to protect yourself, I saw that when you broke into my flat and almost collapsed."

She seethes, unwilling to admit that he's right. "Whatever. Follow me, see if I care."

She reaches the garage mercifully quickly. She pushes the door open with little difficulty, and grabs her motorcycle. When Gendry sees it, he lets out a sigh of relief.

"I'm so glad you didn't total her." He gives her a smile that she doesn't return and hands her her helmet.

She accepts it. "Where did you find that?"

He nods in the general direction of the ground as she jams the helmet on and gets up on her bike; to his amusement, she has to hop and scrabble a bit in order to clamber on.

"We're not all giants," she grumbles, settling into the seat and fumbling around for her gloves, stowed away in some compartment somewhere; she didn't have the time to put them on yesterday.

"No, you're just short." He walks along side her as she shifts into first gear, bike rumbling.

She rolls her eyes. "Go away."

He begins to jog as she speeds up. "See you around."

She snorts and speeds off, hoping she left him in a cloud of dust. She looks back as she cuts into traffic, sees him standing in the mouth of the alleyway with his hands jammed into his pockets. She's sure he's grinning, blue eyes brighter than the sky above, even if she can't see him.

_See you around. _For his sake, she hopes she doesn't.


	5. Gendry III

**A/N: Exposition! I liked writing this chapter. Descriptions are fun.**

* * *

"You should have seen it," Lem says, a crude grin on his face. "The size of her! I'd say she weighed more than you do," he adds, elbowing Gendry.

"No wonder she arrested you," Gendry mumbles, draining his glass, even though it's mostly bitter foam by now. "How'd you get out, in any case?"

"Ol' Harwin bailed us. You know the Starks pay him out the ass. They've been nervy, ever since that ruckus with their eldest girl..."

Gendry decides to tune out. He's had enough of Starks to last him a lifetime.

He casts a tired eye around the bar, which is cramped and smoky and loud. Some band is banging away in the corner as the two sisters behind the bar serve quick as lightning, pouring and pulling. He orders another beer, and the younger girl dashes off. Anguy and Tom are over in the corner, crouched over the pool table, as the former breaks.

"Where's Ned?" Gendry wonders.

"Dayne? College, or something. Him and his ambitions." Lem lets out a booming laugh.

Gendry sighs, and tries not to feel jealous. None of these men have ever worked a proper day in their life, and nor will they. Technically, they're security guards, employed by Beric Dondarrion of Hollow Hill Holdings, but Gendry knows they don't do a tap. Dondarrion doesn't seem to care. Ned's his nephew of sorts, who tags along sometimes; he's a nice boy, and a decent boxer, if somewhat easily impressed. Gendry fell in with them when he fixed up Dondarrrion's Volann and then his company's data protection system. The man is kind enough, but every time he looks at Gendry, he feels like his sole remaining eye is looking at someone else entirely.

"Let's not talk about pretty purple-eyed Dayne, though," Lem says suddenly, turning to face Gendry. "Someone saw you coming out of your flat... with a plus one."

Gendry curses beneath his breath. There's another reason why Dondarrion keeps them on; none of them miss a single thing. They're not spies, really, just as nosy as a gaggle of old ladies, but they notice things that other people don't, things that Dondarrion uses to his advantage. The world of business is a cut-throat one. "Anguy checking up on me?"

"He was worried when you didn't answer last night," Lem shrugs, gulping down some of his bitter lager. "Tell me. You never bother with girls... what did you do with this one?"

"I played cards with her. What do you think?" He can't tell them the truth. just in case it gets back to Harwin, who is a personal guard to the Stark family and will definitely recognise Arya Stark; she'll never be left out of the house again.

"Ya fuck her?" When Gendry fails to respond, he keeps going on. "Did you make the beast with two backs? Did you play with the box the baby came out of? Did you smash her portcullis in? Did you toast the-"

"I slept with her, okay?" Gendry is almost sure he's blushing, admitting to something he didn't do, but if he didn't cut in, Lem would never stop, and if he heard another word, he would've broken his glass on Lem's face and ruined his grubby yellow shirt.

Lem grins widely, slinging his arm around Gendry's shoulders. "Oho! So you're not such a blushing maid, huh? Was she-" The man makes a gesture with his fingers. Gendry refuses to look.

"I'm no maid."

"Wait, yeah, there was that girl with the..." Lem waves his hands around his chest, in universal man speak for boobs.

Gendry shudders. "Gods, no – she looked like me!" Bella had the bright blue eyes and the jet black hair he's only ever seen in the mirror. He doesn't know where he gets his colouring from; his mother was blond and doe-eyed, from the one picture he has of her sitting on grass, a radiant smile on her freckled face. He doesn't remember her, only the smell of antiseptic and thin hands brushing through his hair. She died, he went to an orphanage and then a string of foster homes. He ran away when he was sixteen, fell out of a hole in the system and landed back in the poverty from whence he'd came.

Lem grunts, and finishes his beer. "So you are a maid?"

Gendry ignores him; Harwin is entering, hand aloft. Perhaps he can help; his close association with the Stark family could be of use.

"My man!" Len waves him over, and Harwin slides onto the stool beside them. "How are the wolves?"

"Snappy." He rolls his eyes. "The youngest girl came home injured again."

_Again?_ Lem voices Gendry's unsaid concerns.

"She came home about a week ago with her motorcycle all broke – she stormed out after an argument about Jon."

"He's the bastard boy on the heroin, isn't he?" Lem chuckles. "Typical. Bastard blood always shows." Gendry coughs, and Lem realises his words. "Sorry."

After shooting Lem a glare, Gendry prompts Harwin to continue. "She hurt again?"

The man nods. "Sprained elbow, but she was mostly fixed up. Wouldn't tell them what happened." Harwin groans, pushing his hair back from his face. "It's all because of that Snow boy – the moment he left, that family broke. Ned's got it hard enough keeping Robert in line, he don't need a rebel daughter."

_Jon Snow._ Gendry has a name; often, that's all he needs. Jon Snow, heroin, Bloody Mummers, Arya's gun. It's all shaping up to make a picture he doesn't like the look of. He commiserates with Lem and Harwin until he finishes his beer, strolls over to Anguy to try and retrieve the money he's owed (he ends up snatching the newly-won bills out of his friend's pocket) and leaves. Lem tells him, guffawing, "to fuck that girl good" and Gendry agrees as best he can without actually contemplating it; his hyperactive mind comes with a hyperactive imagination, and if he lets that idea take root he won't be able to sleep tonight. Besides, she's eighteen and noble and dangerous; he's twenty-three and aimless, with nothing but his hands and a shitty laptop. He's lucky she even looked at him, even though he's pretty sure he doesn't want anything like that from her.

Jon Snow, heroin, Bloody Mummers. Jon Snow, heroin, Bloody Mummers.

He tries to sleep, honestly, but every time he close his eyes he hears Lem laughing about fucking and sees Arya, yanking his t-shirt off her slim body. He feels like an out-of-control teenager, all hormones and awkward dreams about the hot teacher. The only thing that will distract him right now is his computer, so he decides to put his excess energy to use and boots his laptop up, waiting impatiently as it finally grumbles into life.

First, the Starks.

_Descended from the First Men, the Kings of the North, the great House Stark, Lords Paramount of the North. Direwolves, honour, Winter is Coming. The Old Gods, warging, greensight, Bran the Builder, the Wall._

He feels the weight of the name pressing down on his shoulders just reading about it. No wonder Arya refrained from telling him. Enough of history; what about the current family?

_Eddard Stark, CEO of Winterfell, Inc., pictured alongside wife Catelyn Tully._ Ned Stark's face is stern, grey eyes flinty. His wife is warmer, a handsome woman with russet-red curls and river-blue eyes, framed with lines made by laughter. Arya is almost wholly her father, but Catelyn's smile as she gazes at her husband is very similar to the one her daughter infrequently wears.

Who else? She mentioned brothers...

_Robb Stark and Jon Snow, co-captains of King Torrhen's Secondary School's boxing team, lifting the National Inter-College Boxing Cup._ These are the boys he saw earlier, the ones around the same age. One is almost exactly like Catelyn Tully, blue-eyed with auburn curls; Robb, then. The other boy...

Jon Snow is bruised and sweaty, dark hair ruffled as he stares at the cup in awe. His smile is not quite as winning as his half-brother's, but it is there, curling his lips as he marvels at their hard-won trophy. Nothing from this picture speaks of a potential heroin addict. What happened to this victorious boy?

Another, more recent picture comes up when he searches for Robb Stark;_ Detectives Robb Stark and Theon Greyjoy, standing over a record-breaking haul of heroin._ Shiny police badges are visible on their lapels; whereas Theon is smirking, Robb's face is hard, blue eyes dark; he resembles his father more in this picture. He recognises the look; it was on Arya's face yesterday as she whispered, _"If that's what it takes."_

Gendry sighs and keeps digging, but as he browses through the photos, he catches an all-too-familiar glimpse of blond hair.

_Joffrey Baratheon and Sansa Stark at a fundraiser for the people of Slaver's Bay._ Sansa is her mother in miniature, as beautiful as any woman he's ever laid eyes on. If Joffrey's arm slung low around her waist discomfits her, her polite smile does not show it. Her boyfriend is smirking odiously, green eyes glittering with malice, his golden Rolex digging into the soft skin of Sansa's bare wrist.

Joffrey. He knows the expression on the little shit's face; he saw it last year, as Joffrey watched him stagger out of his garage with a mouthful of blood. He didn't even have the decency to brutalise him himself; his bug ugly hound of a guard attacked him. Gendry only barely managed to fend the brute off. He didn't dare press charges; Joffrey would only press them right back, and he would win. He still doesn't know the meaning behind that random attack and he does not wish to. Curiosity kills the cat.

He decides not to look Arya up; that could be dangerous. Besides, he knows her face all too well already. Instead, he skips to the next two siblings; Bran and Rickon.

_Bran and Rickon Stark sparring at yesterday's underage boxing tournament in White Harbour._ Bran is tall and wide with a perfect stance; he's making short work of his little brother. Their red hair is flying, their deep blue eyes are sparkling, and though Bran is grinning, Rickon's face is twisted up in a threatening look of concentration.

The next photo of Bran shows him in a wheelchair, slumped, defeated. His entire family is gathered around him in solidarity, a cluster of grey and black on the steps of a courthouse. Arya is shooting daggers at some poor reporter.

There is one glaring exception in the image; Jon Snow.

Bran's transition from healthy boy to paraplegic, Jon's sudden departure and subsequent addiction, Robb's grim face over the drug haul, Sansa's fake smile as Joffrey curls around her...

As a child, Gendry thought that money would solve all of his problems. Now, he realises that sometimes, it only makes things worse.

Sighing, he shuts his laptop down and tries to sleep. Work starts early tomorrow, and he has enough to think about to keep his mind away from Arya.

There are no wolves in his dreams tonight, only ravens, cawing incessantly.


	6. Arya III

**A/N:** Sansa and Arya get to be teenagery! Yay!

* * *

"_Sansa,_" Arya hisses, teeth clenched. "Get out."

Her sister shuts the door behind her with her hip. "No." She flounces over and drops onto Arya's bed, almost pushing her off.

Arya grits her teeth. There were benefits to her closer relationship with Sansa, like having a convenient person to complain to (Arya never knew how cathartic a good bitch could be; in that respect, her old male friends were practically useless) and being able to double-team their parents on matters of import, like faster broadband and getting Bran a haircut.

The downside is things like this; Sansa demanding that Arya tell her her feelings, spill her secrets. Arya doesn't exactly deal well with this kind of thing; Sansa tells her that she had the emotional range of a teaspoon, but she can't help it. Arya favours the bottle-it-up-and-punch-it-out approach when it comes to her problems; Sansa very much believes that a problem shared is a problem halved.

"I fell, okay? Shit happens." Arya shuts her laptop. "Seven hells, Sansa. Drop it."

"So you fell. Whatever. You fell into a ditch once when you were four and you started laughing like a manic hyena." Sansa fixes her sister with a Catelyn Tully™ stare. "Where did you go after? I'm certain you didn't go to a hospital, but you didn't come home, either. Did you stay with someone?"

"You know I don't have any friends in King's Landing."

"That doesn't mean you haven't made some," Sansa reminds her, eyes narrowing. "So, who did you stay with?"

"No-one!"

Sansa raises one perfectly shaped eyebrow, and Arya gives in. "Okay. Someone."

"Someone?" When Arya doesn't respond, Sansa's jaw drops. "Oh my gods. You stayed with a man, didn't you?"

"So what?" Arya goes for flippant, but she just comes off as defensive.

"Arya, I know you're legal, but please don't tell me-"

"I didn't! What do you take me for, a whore?" Arya huffs and pushes her hair back. "Look, he saw me fall off my bike and was kind enough to help patch me up. I didn't want to go home and he let me sleep on his couch. He was nice, nothing else. In any case, if he had tried..." Arya lets the sentence trail off threateningly. Sansa has seen her in action; in particular, that one time Joffrey said that drugs were a way of whittling off those who were to weak to cope in society by rendering them incapable. Arya punched him so hard that the imprint of her wolf's-head ring stayed on his cheek for two whole months; he even had to wear foundation.

Sansa's blue eyes are calculating. "You stayed with him... You wouldn't stay with a total stranger. Not your style. You must know him. Not one of your boxing friends; he would have called Robb if he was."

"You're making my headache worse, you know."

Oblivious, Sansa continues. "So, an acquaintance, and a recent one at that, from King's Landing... that's a limited pool. You don't meet people here very often." She shoots her a glance. "No offence."

"None taken," Arya grumbles, lying back down and squeezing her eyes shut.

"He must be..." Sansa's hands crash against the bed and Arya falls off with a yell. Spread-eagled on the floor, she looks up to see her sister peeking over the edge of the bed. "The mechanic!"

"Are you psychic or something?"

"No, just your sister." Sansa smiles brightly, and extends a manicured hand to help haul her up off the floor. "Please tell me you saw him naked." The smile becomes devious; what sort of effect did Margaery Tyrell have on her prim, demure sister?

"No!" Arya yelps.

Sansa is unimpressed. Her sculpted eyebrows rise.

"Well. He was wearing pants..." She tries her very hardest not to think of hard pecs against her cheek and a v-cut framing a six-pack, muscles formed not by endless hours in the gym, but by work and life. What is _wrong_ with her?

Sansa is grinning outright, grabbing a pillow. "I'm so excited! You might like a boy! I have to call Jeyne, she'll die." She extricates her phone from her pocket and begins tapping, before looking back up at Arya. "By the way, ignore my comment earlier. I give you my express permission to have sex with him."

"I've known him for four days!"

Her sister shrugs, eyes never leaving the phone.

Arya can't find it in herself to be properly angry. Sansa used to smile all the time, back before him; for the longest time after, she was sullen and quiet, eyes far away. If Arya can make her sister smile, even if it is at her own expense, it's worth it.

She pulls her fingers through her hair, unbound for once; there's just so damn much of it that she usually gives up and ties it back. She would hack it all off in an instant, chop every unruly dark curl, but for her mother. Catelyn brushed her hair when she was young, braided it and fashioned it into elaborate buns and tails that usually came undone after a day of horsing around with Robb and Jon. Her father always wore a strange, wistful smile every time he saw her hair down, and Arya is no fool; she knows why. She sees the picture of Lyanna, Brandon, Benjen and her father on the dresser in the kitchen every day. Lyanna is wearing an oversized white shirt that she probably stole from one of her brothers and worn jeans, grinning as she gives poor skinny little Benjen a noogie; Brandon is laughing, head thrown back, and her father is staring at them all in bemused adoration. There are no pictures of Lyanna with Robert, her old betrothed, or of Catelyn with Brandon, whom she was originally promised to; only her parents' wedding photo, her father on crutches, his new wife solemn. She wonders if Lyanna ever actually loved Robert, or if she even loved the man that stole her; she doubts it. Lyanna was too wild for any man to settle her, never mind get a child on her. Like herself, she supposes.

Her fingers catch on a knot, and she casts a glance at Sansa, smiling at her phone. She doesn't want to ruin the contentment settled over her sister, but it's now or never.

"I went to see Jon the other day," she blurts out.

Sansa's phone slides from her hands, and her smile does the same. "What? Where is he? How is he?" Sometimes, Arya forgets that Jon wasn't just hers; he was Sansa's brother too, even if they were never particularly affectionate towards one another.

"He's in a shitty old house down in Flea Bottom, with some other lads. Sansa, he's..." Arya hesitates. Her sister's eyes drill into her, the ponds of blue frozen over. "Unrecognisable."

Sansa's eyes drop, lips curving down. Sadness does not suit her sister. "He must really be irredeemable," she murmurs. Suddenly, her chin tilts up. "And is that why you got hurt? You went after his..." She inhales. "Dealers?"

Arya nods. "The Brave Companions."

"You _idiot_," Sansa hisses, grabbing her arms so that Arya has no choice but to stare into her sister's eyes. "They're armed to the teeth! They could have seriously hurt you, or worse! Did you hear what they did to that poor girl? They used a stick to-"

"I had a gun as well!"

Sansa flushes dark red. "Of course you did! Do you think a gun makes you invincible? Just look at old Aerys Targaryen! He had plenty of guns, but that didn't stop his faithful bodyguard Jaime Lannister from putting a bullet in his skull!" Her hands leave Arya's arms and slip around her, pulling her into a tight hug. Arya stiffens, fingers clenched in her bedsheets.

"Sansa..."

"I've lost one sibling," her sister whispers, quiet voice further dampened by Arya's hair. "I can't lose you too."

Relenting, her hands slide up Sansa's back to rest on her shoulders. "You won't," she vows, more to herself than anything, and then draws away from her to lock eyes with her sister again. "But I need your help. I know we can get Jon back, and you're the only one that can help me. Robb will lose his job if he does, and I don't want to get Bran involved if I can help it. And Rickon..."

"Out of the question," Sansa finishes. She gazes at Arya's hands on her shoulders, biting her lip.

After what feels like an eternity, she agrees. "Fine. We'll do this together. A pause, and then; "Please tell me you have a plan."

"Don't I always? I'll need to go undercover and infiltrate the ring."

"How?" Sansa's head tips to the side. "They''ll recognise you immediately."

"That's where you come in." Standing up, Arya proceeds to the en-suite bathroom that joins her sister's room to hers. "Come on. I have the scissors ready."

Sansa rises and follows her, closing the bathroom door behind her as she enters. She takes the scissors Arya hands her, and watches, jaw slack, as Arya pulls her hair over her shoulder. "Are you sure?"

"Certain." Arya closes her eyes, and feels the hair begin to fall away, like so many worries.


	7. Gendry IV

**A/N: I'm not too happy with this chapter... Gendry's mood changes were hard to pin down properly. Oh well.**

* * *

It isn't even four o'clock, and Gendry is already wrecked. Mott gave him a call this morning and told him that he wouldn't be able to get in today and that he'd have to handle it all himself, which is fine; he'll be paid overtime, and Seven knows he needs the money. But he's hungover and tired and generally in a bad mood, which doesn't help when you're dealing with customers worrying that their transmission is gone when, really, their car mat just got wedged under the brake.

He sighs, and finishes jacking an old Lyshi up. His creeper is almost gone; its wheels are making alarming noises, and it creaks threateningly each time he puts weight on it, but he isn't about to shell out for a new one. The Lyshi's cat has failed, and he starts by removing the oxygen sensor. As he's loosening the bolts, the garage door swings open.

"Mott? Thought you weren't coming back," he calls, sliding out from under the car and sitting up. "Did you f-"

Safe to say, the figure standing in the door isn't his boss. Arya picks her way through assorted bits and pieces, kicking some old valve springs beside. A navy beanie slouches off her head.

She settles on the car beside him; luckily, it's already done, so it isn't on jacks or anything, so the whole thing doesn't collapse underneath her. "How goes the work?"

"What in seven hells are you doing here? I swear, if you broke your bike again-"

"No, I didn't! I was bored!" She huffs, and yanks her hat off.

He knew something was wrong. Her hair was long before, and curly; after her shower in his flat the other day, it hung down her back in a wet mass. Now it's all gone, hacked off to just above her chin.

She sees him eyeing her new hairdo. "Ya like it?" She tosses her head like a vain cheerleader.

Yes, he does, but he isn't going to tell her that. "It's almost as short as mine."

"That's what I was going for," she tells him evenly.

"Who did it?" Not a professional, in any case; the edges are ragged.

"My sister. Mother went off the rails. She says I should be done with teenage rebellion. Looks like I'm not."

He snorts, but as he opens his mouth to say something he'll probably regret, the computer over over in the corner shrills. He pushes the creeper away to go check it out; a businessman brought a Dorn Lancer in today, and he's had diagnostics running on it since.

"Fuel injection," he mutters. "Of course, it's a Lancer, what else is new?"

Arya pops up behind him, and he almost drops the scanner. "Seven hells! Make some noise when you walk, will you?"

"I didn't think an car mechanic would have to use a computer," she observes, forehead crinkling.

"Everything has a computer in it nowadays. Cars are no different." He knows he's being rude, but he's wrecked and he's sick of people taking the term grease monkey far too literally.

"Huh," she mumbles, scrolling down the list, eyes running over data she doesn't have a hope of understanding. "Just didn't think you had it in you."

The comment is innocuous, probably meant as a compliment more than anything, but it rubs him the wrong way, inflames the inferiority complex that has largely remained dormant since secondary school. He steps back, and she moves forward to get a closer look at the wires hooked up to the computer. "Of course. I'm too thick for that, aren't I?"

She whirls around, grey eyes hot. "What's wrong with you? I didn't mean it like that!"

He's already regretting this, but he's tired and angry and confused, because this girl has waltzed into his life and made everything else seem dull by comparison.

"I'm sure you didn't, Lady Stark, you're much too polite and mannerly to insult a blue-collar, aren't you?" He stops to glare at her, her back to the desk as he towers over her. "Oh. Wait."

Her eye are no longer narrowed in anger, but have been widened by shock. "Stark? How did you-"

"I can use a computer. I'm very good with computers, in fact. I know your social security number, I know your medical record, and I know about your druggie bastard brother."

He expects her to explode at him, to grab the wrench beside her hand and beat him bloody with it. Instead, she grins wide. "Gendry, you're exactly-"

"What? Right?"

"No. I would never underestimate you, you know that!" Her fingers fasten around his arm to pull him down to her level, and he's suddenly very aware of how close he's gotten to her in his anger. "You might be exactly what I'm looking for!"

"What, an angry bastard mechanic?"

"An angry bastard mechanic _hacker_," she counters. "I don't believe in fate, but this is..."

"Get on with it."

"I need you to create a false identity for me." Her grip tightens, vice-like.

"Why, exactly?"

She breathes in, lashes veiling her grey eyes. "I'm going to infiltrate the Bloody Mummers, but I won't stop there. The Cleganes, the-" Her breath hitches, and she pause, as if she can't believe that she's going to say this. "The Lannisters. I'm going to take them down and rip them into tiny pieces. I'm going to get my brother back."

"You think a haircut will make you unrecognisable?"

"Ever heard of a binder?" He stares at her, incredulous, and she rushes on. "I mean, I don't have an awful lot there already, but if I do that, if I get contacts and the right clothes, get fake scars and stubble-"

"You're going to become a boy?"

She presses her lips together and nods.

"Won't your parents notice?"

"I'll move out, but I'm going to tell them I'm going railing in the Free Cities for a while, keep with the teenage rebellion thing. Sansa will cover for me. They won't notice."

"And I come in where?"

"You'll be my partner. Backup. I'll never ask you to hold a gun or anything, just... research. You found all that shit about me out in... what, two hours?"

"One."

She smiles sharply. "I need an advantage against these people. You can hack security systems, can't you? Take cameras offline, steal data transmissions..." Her eyes are passionate, determined. "With me on the ground and you backing me up, I'll be unstoppable. I'll give you whatever you want, it doesn't matter. Just help me. You'll be duly rewarded."

He stares at her as his mind launches into overdrive. Her cheeks are flushed and her hair is ruffled, sticking out from her head.

This is dangerous, more dangerous than anything he's ever done, and he once tried to go drag racing after four shots of tequila. Logically, he should say no; he learned not to bring trouble down on himself a long time ago. But he's sick of this living, of mundanity; the mediocrity of his life scratches at his lungs, and makes his ribs buckle. This is his chance to do something, to claw his way put of his poverty-stricken life, to get away from his desolate past.

In any case, he can't let her do it alone. Arya is more courageous than a lion, and as fierce as a wolf, but she's going to need someone in her corner. He doesn't mind; in fact, he wants to help her, even if her plan is crazier than old Aerys Targaryen.

He was doomed, really, from the moment she wheeled her motorcycle into this garage.

"All right," he agrees, finally. "I'll help you out."

Her face brightens and she grins widely. Her arms twitch, and for one mad moment he thinks she's going to hug him.

She doesn't. Instead, she pushes him gently away.

"I knew you would." She sounds incredibly sincere as she turns her face up to him.

"I can't let you do it alone. If you landed into my flat like that again, I'd have a heart attack."

She scowls, and he can't help the grin that spreads across his face. "Don't you have work to do?"

He starts; he almost forgot about the Lyshi up on the jacks. He'll work the Lancer out later. "You're right." He moves towards the other side of the garage, and she follows him.

As he lies back down on the creeper, Arya perches herself on a workbench scattered with tools. "You're not going home?" he asks.

He hears her, rather than sees her, shake her head. "Do you mind if I stay here?"

"Just as long as you don't break anything." He picks the wrench up and begins to unbolt the cat, first the front, and then the back.

She ignores that. "What are you doing?"

"Replacing a catalytic converter."

"This thing?" He scoots out from beneath the car, the busted cat in hand, as she waves the new one around.

"Yep." She hands it to him, along with the gasket he indicates. He retreats back under the car, and replaces the gasket. Levering the cat into place, he asks "You know anything about cars?"

"I'm better with bikes. I maintain mine."

"You didn't build it, though." He tightens the nut onto the pipe with his hands.

"No. Jon did." She's quiet, feet knocking against the counter. "I miss him a lot."

He stills under the car, a bolt slipping from his fingers.

She continues, hesitant. "He always treated me properly. Robb was always a little condescending, and Sansa thought I was a freak of nature... Jon and I bonded. The day he left, I..."

Gendry waits for her to speak, but she doesn't make a sound. "Why did he leave?"

"I don't know. He had an argument with Dad, and before we knew it he was storming out of the keep with Ghost. The dogs howled all night." The banging of her feet ceases. "He didn't even say goodbye."

Ghost. A dog, probably; he's seen the telltale hair on Arya's clothes. "And he fled all the way to King's Landing from Winterfell?"

"Yep." She laughs bitterly. "I bet he never expected us to follow; I didn't. But one of my dad's old friends needed help... Ned Stark always comes to the rescue."

Gendry screws the oxygen sensor back into place, quickly checking the wiring as he does so. "Your father sounds like a good man," he tells her as he emerges from beneath the car to remove it from the jacks.

"He is... but he's too good." She stands up to help him, and once the car is grounded, she asks if she can test it out. He relents, probably too easily, but he feels guilty about his tantrum earlier. He hates his temper, hates the outbursts that take even him by surprise. He always worries, after; what would happen if he lost control? Would he hurt someone, or worse? He almost hit one of his foster fathers once, in an argument that he can barely remember; they weren't long kicking him out after that.

He tries to imagine hitting Arya, but the image sends a shudder down his spine. In any case, she'd hit him back, and twice as hard.

He makes a stab at apologising when she glides back into the garage, but she brushes him off with oddly noble grace. "No harm, no foul," she says breezily, flapping a hand, as she moves over to the Lancer. "So, what do you have to do here?"

The remaining few hours proceed in much the same fashion; Arya aiding where she can, and complaining where she can't. Gendry hits his head off an exhaust pipe at one point, and she laughs so hard that she falls off the step-ladder she's sitting on. Slowly, he begins to learn about her life; her dog, Nymeria, an ageing Northern Skagosi wolf dog, her passion for boxing (she demonstrates a few moves and almost breaks a winch), and her little brother Rickon's recent suspension. In return, he tells her about the foster father who thought he was Bael the Bard, the hedgehog he tried to adopt when he was five, his first disastrous job as a bartender.

"Turns out you're supposed to tilt the glass," he finishes, as Arya breaks into cacophonous laughter.

Her phone begins to chime; he recognises the song, some saccharine dance hit from across the Narrow Sea. "Sansa," she sighs, and turns away to answer the call.

He stands up and stretches, glancing at the clock and flinching. Eight? Sure enough, outside the sky is fading to a dusky indigo. In the time he's been talking with Arya, four hours have slipped by.

"No!" Arya's voice is high pitched, embarrassed. "Sansa, I didn't-! Stop it! I swear, if you don't shut up..."

There is silence, and then a snarl from Arya as she shoves the phone into her pocket.

"Did you argue?" he queries, wiping the grease off his hands.

"I told her we're partnering up, and she took it sort of... um..."

He hopes he's not blushing. "Oh."

"She's just...excited. I don't really go in for boys."

"What about girls?"

She gives him a scornful look.

"Just asking."

She shakes her head, and grabs her hat off the workbench she left it on. "Boys." The word drips with the kind of derision generally reserved for vapid celebrities and corrupt politicians. He grins as she marches towards the door, pausing by the sign. "See you tomorrow?"

"Of course, milady."

She growls something indistinct, and when she flips the sign around it clatters against the window.

He smiles to himself, and begins to close up.


	8. Arya IV

**A/N: Lots of family-ness and tickle battles.**

* * *

**Part II**

Arya squirms in her seat as her father bears down on her, suddenly seeming about ten times taller than usual. "The Free Cities?"

"Arya..." Her mother's voice drips with dismay.

"You know I'm not happy here in King's Landing, and since I'm not starting college until next year, I thought I'd take some time out and go travel. I think it'll be a good experience." Arya tries her very hardest to sound adult and responsible.

Sansa interrupts helpfully. "A lot of people rail around the Free Cities. I was talking to a few girls, and they said they had an amazing time, and Arya's always been good with languages. Wouldn't it be great for her to get some real practice in Braavosi and Volantene?"

Her father seems to be bending slightly, but Catelyn's face is rigid in its disapproval. "I've heard what young people get up to over there! If you had someone to go with you, it'd be fine, but-"

"Arya is an adult, Catelyn," her father reminds her, laying a hand on her shoulder. "She's more than able to protect herself." He gives his daughter an amused look. "Besides, she can almost pass for a boy with that new hair of hers."

Her mother sighs. "Gods above... Coming home hurt, cutting off all your lovely hair..." She focusses on Arya, and finally, smiles. It doesn't quite reach her eyes, but it relieves Arya anyway. "But you'll call us every day, won't you?"

Arya nods furiously, her heart rising in her chest. "I'll try!"

"You will." Her father stands up, and the squeak of his chair seals the decision. "When are you leaving?"

"Day after tomorrow, hopefully. Sansa will drive me to the airport." Her sister lays her hand over the back of her chair in a show of solidarity.

"Very well." Her father's phone starts ringing, and he answers it with a little difficulty; he can barely handle a block, never mind a smartphone. He exits the room to conduct the conversation, directing an apologetic hand gesture to his wife.

Her mother watches him as he walks out the door, accepting his apology with a smile; when it shuts, she returns her attention to the sisters seated side-by-side. "I must go collect Rickon from training; I don't want to leave him out in the rain. Sansa, do you mind putting the chicken on in twenty minutes?"

Sansa stands up, dusting off her navy skirt. "Sure!"

Arya gets up as well to find her mother's coat and her keys; Catelyn can never find them herself, and always appreciates help. When she hands them over, her mother holds her shoulder.

"Be careful, my little wolf," she whispers, that singularly maternal mix of concern, exasperation and love shining in her deep blue eyes.

"I will." For once, Arya doesn't wriggle when Catelyn presses a kiss to her cheek.

When the driveway is empty and her father's footsteps have faded up the stairs, she finally lets the guilt settle on her. She crumples into a chair and lets out an indistinct moan. Arya loathes lying, especially to her parents. Her father raised her to be better than that, to be better than to betray the trust in her mother's eyes.

Sansa sits down beside her, but in a far more graceful manner than Arya's haphazard descent. "You don't have to do this, you know," she tells her. "You could just give up and go across the Narrow Sea to travel. You could see the Titan of Braavos, taste Tyroshi pear brandy, hear the bells of Norvos..."

The offer is tempting. She closes her eyes for a second; she can almost smell spices in the markets of Pentos and feel fine Myrish lace...

The moment dissipates. Arya opens her eyes.

"I can't," she says, simply.

Sansa nods, resigned. "I'll be there to help you every step of the way, okay?"

Arya snickers. "What am I doing, having a baby?"

Sansa's jaw drops, scandalised. "Arya! Don't joke about... Wait." Her eyes narrow. "Unless you are... By the gods. What were you doing with that mechanic?" Sansa dives for her stomach.

It's Arya's turn to shriek at her sister, but she stops when she notices the mirth sparkling in her sister's eyes. She goes for Sansa's belly as well, and they spend the next few minutes attempting to tickle the other into submission; they end up on the ground, Arya gasping, tears of laughter trickling out of Sansa's eyes.

"I will help you, though," Sansa says suddenly. "Always." Her hand clutches hers.

Arya smiles at her, and feels a sudden rush of both hatred and gratefulness towards Joffrey Baratheon. What he did was despicable, but it dragged she and her sister, kicking and screaming, together. Since they moved down to King's Landing, she and Sansa formed the kind of bond she never thought they'd have when she was thirteen and Sansa was unreachable, in more ways than one.

"Is everyone nice and cosy? Do you want me to get you two a blanket?" Arya turns her head so quickly it cracks off the hardwood floor.

Bran is in the doorway, head tilted to the side. He's grinning, mouth screwed up in his particular smile, and she beams back.

"Join us!" Sansa says brightly, patting the floor beside her.

"Not worth the hassle," he replies, wheeling over to position himself between them. Arya uses one arm to pull herself up, and Sansa the other. Once vertical she ruffles Bran's auburn hair, of a slightly darker shade than Sansa's Titian curls; Robb is even darker, almost brown, but Rickon is fairer, more of a strawberry blond. She is the only one left with Stark dark brown.

"Your hair is longer than mine now!" she exclaims, tugging on a stubborn curl that springs out of the crown of his head.

Bran swats her hands away. "Keep your razor away from me, will you?"

She gives him a half-hearted scowl. "Keep that up, and I'm not bringing you a present from the Free Cities."

"Firewine," Brans says decisively.

Sansa gasps. "Bran! What would Mum say?"

He shrugs, the movement jerky. "I can't get any worse, can I?"

They stare at him in uncomfortable silence before Arya bursts out laughing. Sansa joins in, giggling tentatively.

For nine months after the accident, Bran wallowed in self-pity, and refused to leave his room no matter how much his mother pleaded. Three months ago, when the family moved down to King's Landing, he suddenly developed a dark sense of humour that left their mother floundering as she tried to formulate a response. Sansa thinks the upswing is due to the fact that their new home, and King's Landing in general, is much more accessible than the narrow corridors and winding staircases of their old keep and the icy streets of Winterfell. Privately, Arya believes it's because no-one knows him here; to them he is just a kid in a wheelchair, not the Stark boy with so much potential who had a tragic accident. In Winterfell people pitied him, mourned the loss of his boxing talent; here, they just ignore him.

"I'll bring you back a Lyseni girl as well, if Meera will allow it," she promises, and he huffs, cheeks colouring; Meera is his pretty occupational therapist, and Bran refuses to admit his small crush on her. Her brother Jojen is his psychologist. They used to all be good friends when they were small; Arya particularly liked Meera, who always cycled faster than Robb and Jon and let Arya ride her bike. Her little brother, though... He had and still has a habit of beginning a sentence, leaving it, and finishing it either in the next few minutes or up to three weeks later. Weird, but harmless. When confronted about these oddities, Bran just shrugs, a sheepish smile on his face, and says that as long as he himself isn't crazy, his psychologist can be.

Sansa elbows her. "Don't you have some bags to pack?" She communicates something else with her eyes. Bran is clever, as sharp as a knife and far more observant than any kid his age has a right to be; he'll pick up on any vagueness or uncertainty on Arya's part, and he'll blow her cover to bits.

She wishes with all her heart that she could involve him. Bran idolised both Robb and Jon, and his brother's departure played a part in his accident that Jon never forgave himself for. However, she can't risk him getting hurt, even though he'd hate the coddling.

She rolls her eyes at Bran, who gives her a conspiratorial grin, the one they reserve for when Catelyn is being obstinately motherly, or when Robb is emulating their father, or when Sansa displays her Tully roots. _Family,_ it seems to say, with a _psssh!_ tacked onto the end. Her heart twists. She'll miss Bran and his dry jokes and crinkle-eyed smiles; Robb and Rickon too, of course, but Bran will be the worst.

She bounds up the stairs as she always does; her father calls to her from his study, call concluded. "You'll have to marry a farmer," he tells her, grey eyes soft, "with all the thumping you do up and down those stairs. You're rooted in the earth."

"And move to the Reach?" She wrinkles her nose. "Too warm. Thanks, but no thanks."

He shakes his head, an affectionate smile curling his lips. "Stark in name and Stark in nature." His phone rings again, and he shoots her a contrite look as he answers, struggling with the touchscreen.

Finally, she reaches the relative sanctuary of her room. She can hear Sansa downstairs, humming as she prepares the chicken, Bran's newly deepened voice sounding every now and then. Her father's stern tones float down the hall. The dogs are careering around outside, battling over an old sock, except for Lady, who naps sedately under an elm.

She falls backwards onto her bed with a thump, staring at the ceiling. Her room is rather nice; the wall behind her head is painted wintry blue, and the rest are a nut brown, the colour of sand. Posters of bands and movies plaster the walls. Her punching bag leaks stuffing in the corner, a set of weights inherited from Robb scattered beneath it. Her laptop blinks on her desk, flashing periodically. Beside it is a TV, accompanied by various consoles. Clothes spill out of bags in the corner. She had better hide them soon; if her parents inspect them and find heavy jeans and oversized t-shirts, rather than tank-tops and flimsy shorts, they might begin to doubt the veracity of her story.

The luxury of her room is a far cry from where she's going to be staying, in a shitty little studio in the Bottom with no bedstead and an icebox. Sansa almost fainted when she saw it, but Arya dived into haggling with the landlord. She told Sansa it was out of the way, and it was cheap. She didn't tell her that it was no more than five blocks away from Gendry's place.

She is more willing to throw a virtual stranger who treats her like an actual person into the fray than her brother. She trusts a car mechanic with no degree more than she does her own parents.

Arya wonders what that says about her.

But something in her bones tells her she can trust Gendry. Even when he was looming over her, blue eyes ablaze with fury, she knew with absolute certainty that he wouldn't dare to try to hurt her. In any case, if he did, she's sure she could flip him and split his chiselled chin in two.

She stares at the ceiling, at the lampshade punctured with holes to throw the constellations of the North across the walls. A few months ago, she harboured aspirations of returning home, of attending the university at White Harbour, of returning to her boxing team and her friends and her woods. She is Northern to the bone; the blood of the First Men sings within her. She was made for stone water and iron earth, not the constant sunlight and muggy breezes of the Crownlands.

But she can't go home. She can't even go here. This is her last week before she loses herself, becomes someone else entirely. Arya Stark was a noble girl with the world at her feet, a fierce slip of a thing with ambitions as high as they were honourable. Arry Snow will be a kid raised on housing estates and educated in overcrowded classrooms, a secondary school drop-out with naught but an inflated ego and a loaded gun to his name.

She is not excited. She is simply resolute. Steadfast. Jon will be back with his family within the next twelve months. It is not a promise, not a wish; it is a fact. It is the truth.

Beforehand, she had her doubts. Could she? Would she? Should she? Now, with Gendry at her side, she is certain that she can do it.

After several minutes' deep thinking, she rises with a grumble, bed creaking in protest; she'll never get out of here unless she finishes packing her bags, and if she dallies her mother will get involved, and then things will truly get ugly.


	9. Gendry V

**A/N: This is the last of my backlog of chapters! Hopefully I'll get the chance to continue this, school permitting, but updates will be more irregular from now on.**

* * *

He's in the bathroom when he hears the front door slam open.

"Gendry! Gendry!" Heavy footsteps thud towards the bedroom. "Get out of there! We need to-" The bathroom door rattles alarmingly.

"Seven hells!" he roars. "Let me piss in peace, will you?" He hears her splutter and stomp out to the living room.

When he returns, business done, she's pacing nervously. "This is big, really big."

"What?" He peers at her as she worries her short hair, now shaved into an undercut, with the top tied back into a stubby tail. She must have half a tube of gel on it.

Her transformation from boy to girl is complete, and he occasionally has trouble remembering that, yes, this kid is Arya Stark, and no, she doesn't have a dick. She stands like she does, though, legs splayed, shoulders thrown back and chin jutting up Her jeans are ripped and her hoodie barely conceals the lump of gun at her hip. When she shrugs the hoodie off, her chest is completely flat. He wonders vaguely if the binder is uncomfortable, but if it pains her, she doesn't complain. She does, however, complain about the contacts colouring her eyes a muddy hazel and the men's deodorant she has to wear; he doesn't blame her. Whoever thought that that stuff would ever attract women was severely mistaken.

"There's gonna be a demonstration," she tells him after a few mutters. "Out by the Mud Gate. The Bright Banners were dealing on their turf, and Hoat's not happy. Gendry, this is my chance! I could get in so easily!"

"Have you got a plan?"

"...No?"

He sighs. "Start with that. I'll go find out what I can." He shoves an old newspaper and a marker at her as she sits down with a crash and goes to grab his laptop.

She scribbles beside him as he accesses the police database, quickly navigating to the Bright Banners. An old gang of ill repute, dumb enough and desperate enough to anger the Brave Companions.

"Will you pretend to be a Bannerman?"

"That's a good idea," she murmurs, still writing. "But will they believe me?"

He turns the computer screen towards her. "With this, they will."

She studies the screen and lifts an eyebrow. "A... a tattoo?"

"Gang mark. I should be able to draw it on." He tugs the marker out of her grasp and pauses, hand outstretched.

"What?" she asks peevishly.

"Do you want me to draw it on your forehead, or will you give me your arm already?"

She huffs and lets him take her wrist to press it against the back of the couch. He twists around to get a better angle and secures her elbow with his other hand.

It's easy to replicate the banner on the screen; it twists around her wrist, black ink marring the blue veins that peek through her translucent skin. The ink bleeds slightly, but he thickens the lines to hide it. He hopes that the Black Goat will be badly lit.

Finally, he caps the marker and looks up at her. She's biting her lip, brows drawn together.

"Arya?" He waves his hand in her face.

"Hmm?" She responds sluggishly, but when she notices his confused gaze her cheeks colour momentarily. His thoughts stick to it, but he drags them away.

Arya is his partner. If they don't come up with a plan, she might as well give Vargo Hoat a gun and tell him to shoot her.

"Any ideas?"

She thinks for a few seconds. "I'll go to the Black Goat; the Brave Companions always go there before a brawl. I'll tell them I'm a Bannerman. I'll complain a lot, talk about their failings. I'll suck up to Hoat and ask him if I can come along and shoot a few Bannermen in the balls. Hopefully he'll agree. I'll prove myself against the Bright Banners, and he'll accept me." She pauses for breath. "There. Happy?"

He ponders the plan. "Contact me every hour on the hour. If I could..." He stands up suddenly to search around in his bedroom; he emerges triumphant and hands her his loot.

She examines it curiously, fidgeting with it. "What's this? A fake piercing?"

"A tracker." He plucks it from her fingers and affixes it to her eyebrow. "There. Now I'll know where you are."

Her fingers brush against the jewellery. "Clever." She sounds proud, in an odd way.

"I know." A smug note leaks into his voice.

"Idiot." She says it too fondly for him to take umbrage, so he lets it pass as she rises. "I should get going."

"Good luck." He can feel the nerves beginning to eat away at his stomach.

The smile fades from her face as she strides out the door. He watches out the window as she roars off on her bike, registration plate hidden. He repainted it a few days ago, lightening the shiny black to gunmetal grey, for fear that she would be recognised, either by an acquaintance of the Stark family or by a Bloody Mummer.

He feels, in a rather perverse way, like a proud mother watching their child attend their first day at school.

He relocates to his bedroom and plonks his laptop on the bed, With a glance at his watch, he begins his vigil.

It's past three in the morning, and she still isn't back.

Gendry's fingers clench and unclench, laptop long abandoned. Where is she? What is she doing? She said she would contact him every hour and she did exactly that, up to three a.m. Her text is 19 minutes late.

He rather hopes that she didn't have to use the gun.

His laptop shows him the mostly vacant interior of the Bloody Goat. The image is grainy; the place is too cheap to buy proper beer, let alone a decent security camera. Arya was on it initially, swaggering in and ingratiating herself smoothly into the gang; no-one gave her as much as a look when she departed with them. There were no security cameras to keep an eye on her destination, some derelict old block of flats; thank the gods for that tracker. He'll have to work on figuring out a way to add a camera to it, and a bug.

Her hastily scrawled plan lies abandoned next to him. He picks it up for a second to read her hurried letters, and crumples the page in his fist. Newsprint stains his hands. What if she left too much up to chance? What if they played along with her charade only to shoot her at the flats?

He's almost decided to go after her when the door bangs open. Gendry shocks back and grabs his trusty hammer before he realises that it's Arya invading his bedroom.

"I'm in!" She's smiling, if you could call it that; there is a dangerous edge to it, like a bare blade or a broken bone.

"Congratulations, you're a gangster. I'm sure your mother's proud." He drops the hammer and reclines back onto the bed.

She shakes her head. "I'm one step closer to Jon." He opens one eye to see her clambering up beside him, knees tucked up to her chin, grey eyes filled with strange fervour. She must have discarded her contacts somewhere. She hasn't bothered to do the same with her boots. "It was strange... I just showed off in the pub and they let me come along."

"You blood in?" When she looks at him in confusion, he clarifies, or at least he tries to. "Did you...?" When she doesn't reply, he feels his heart drop. "You didn't..."

"He attacked me first." Her voice is strangely hollow, as if the words are coming from far way, and not from within her. "It... It was so easy to pull the trigger. He just... fell. He would have looked like he was sleeping, but his eyes were open. Hoat congratulated me after."

Silence seethes between them, viscous and ugly. He knew what he was getting in for... but he never thought too hard about her part. A week ago, they were laughing in the garage, but here she is now with blood on her hands and a strangely needy look in her eyes.

"You really can't go back, now, huh?" Her brother, Robb, is a cop; what would he think? Could he even imagine Arya pulling a trigger and watching someone die by her own hand?

Gendry can.

"In this game, you win or you die. I knew that from the start." She pauses, sucking in air. "I plan to win."

He has no doubt she will.

The clock ticks on; eventually, she breaks the silence. "They'll contact me, they said. To initiate me. A fight, three against one."

"Child's play for you." The hint of a smile plays around the corners of her lips; it is gone almost as quickly as it came.

"I could probably beat those poor arseholes one-handed." The hollow tone in her voice has vanished to be replaced by bullheaded determination.

He opens his mouth to agree, to tease her about her fighting skill, but he's interrupted by a yawn. The adrenaline of worrying after Arya has vanished, and his lack of sleep this past week has caught up with him.

"You know what, I'm going to hit the sack. You can go home or whatever, or you can sleep on the couch. Up to you." He stands up to change, but she grabs his arm.

"I... I don't want to sleep alone tonight."

Never before has he seen Arya Stark vulnerable; he didn't think she was capable of it. The look in her eyes right now an only be described as such; open, unguarded. For once, she looks all of her eighteen years.

Words are failing him right now; all he can think of are sappy things straight from a rom-com and bad innuendoes from the same. He nods, and she lets go of his arm to lie back down. He hears her boots thud to the floor as he enters the bathroom, clothes in hand.

When he slides into bed, she has shed her hoodie and jeans. She's all curled up, and her sticky hair is loose around her face.

He closes his eyes, and is lulled gradually to sleep by her even breaths.


End file.
